We Are Tomodachi Spring / Summer 2017

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23Users add fundsto their accountsat a Liquid Pay cash register.Users registertheir ngerprintsand phone number.Payments at shopsare made withngerprint identication.The amount due isdeducted from theuser’s account,and the transactionis complete.Proprietary imageanalysis technology groupsngerprints and addsthem to thebig data store.High-speed checksare made withanalysis technologyusing machine learning.Liquid Pay allows speedy, secure payment using the company’s original sensors and software to record fingerprint data while preventing duplication or other misuse, along with its own fraud-prevention system.Yasuhiro KudaCEO, Liquid Inc. (http://liquidinc.asia/en/)Worked for Daiwa Securities SMBC, from 2007 to 2011. After a spell as a fund manager at a venture capital firm, he established Liquid Inc. in December 2013, which has developed the Liquid Pay biometrics authentication system.Japan is rapidly moving toward “Society 5.0,” adding a fifth chapter to the four major stages of human development: hunter-gatherer, agricultural, industrial, and information. In this new ultra-smart society, all things will be connected through IoT technology and all technologies will be integrated, dramatically improving the quality of life.Looking ahead to this new era, the government of Japan will do everything it can to encourage various players, including start-ups and “hidden gems” among middle- and small-sized enterprises, to come up with brand-new and innovative ideas presenting solutions for the world.About Society 5.0The Liquid Pay SystemConventional fingerprint authenticationFingerprint authentication with new technologyFingerprint authentication up to now has relied mainly on image data, which raises security concerns, such as the possibility of data theft. The Liquid Pay system is the world’s first technology that relies on a new type of biometric authentication technology. The feature points of each fingerprint are digitized and indexed using a proprietary algorithm. And artificial intelligence is used to conduct speedy searches, making the authentication process more than 100 times faster than conventional methods. The system also authenticates sweat glands and veins for increased accuracy.